Astronaut
by Martakus
Summary: The population of Berk is endangered as there seem to be less and less fish in the sea. But who - or what! - is responsible for that? Astrid and Hiccup decide to go explore together. Near-canon story, except that Hiccup was 15 during the events of the second movie and 10 during the first. The story plays 3 years after the second movie, when Hiccup is 18.
1. A wish for something more

Author´s Note: I´d like to note that some names and perhaps also ideas in this work have been inspired/taken from the Perry Rhodan franchise. However, no characters have been directly adapted from it, which is why I will not mark this work as a 'crossover'. To all readers who don´t know the aforementioned franchise: Don´t bother to google it, it´ll just spoil where the story is going.

* * *

Hiccup sat on a plot of grass by himself. He gazed into the blue, cloud-specked sky and let his thoughts run free. The wind brought the bickering of some baby dragons to his ears, and he couldn´t help but smile and chuckle silently. He needed to do this more often. He closed his eyes, lay down and looked back on the last three years. Ever since Valka had come to Berk, the village had prospered in a way it never had before. They were now keeping much closer contact to other tribes - after all, Valka had already mapped their surroundings - and exchanged experiences to make mutual progress. He had taken over his duties as the new chief with pride and devoted himself to them. Thanks to Gobber´s advice and help, he had learnt fast and done an acceptable job - or at least he hoped so. He wasn´t sure whether he could ever live up to Stoick...

Hiccup quickly chased these thoughts away. He didn´t want to think about his father.

So he thought about Astrid. Thought about their childhood together, remembered how she used to playfully box his shoulder whenever she was mad. Thought about how they grew up, how the cute, cheeky girl had slowly turned into an even cheekier, but beautiful and more mature woman. Thought about his burning red cheeks when he had asked her whether she wanted to move into a home with him after he had decided he wanted to become a bit more independent and no longer live in one house with his mother. She had just laughed at him and agreed.

Since then, he had started admiring her even more. She always stayed cheerful despite having to take care of two dragons - like she had suspected, Hiccup didn´t really have time for Toothless because of his many duties as chief - and basically having to run the household by herself. It was amazing.

With this admiration came longing. Though they lived in the same house, their relationship was still more of a friendship than anything else - they slept in separate beds and Astrid´s occasional playful pecks on his cheek had ceased a while ago. She probably thought they were too old for these kinds of things.

But Hiccup had often turned in his bed and looked at Astrid during nighttime, watched the moon cast its silvery light on her blond hair, her peaceful, perfect eyes, her adorable, round nose and her beautiful, beautiful little smile. He couldn´t count how often he had imagined caressing her cheek with his hand, looking into her blue eyes deeply and pulling her into an embrace, their bodies merging perfectly and their eyes closing because nothing else mattered. He wished he could tell her how he felt - but how? It was tantalizing.

Maybe he should just wake her one night and ask her? But - wouldn´t she be angry because he disturbed her well-earned sleep? Or maybe... at the dinner table? But what if she rejected him? Wouldn´t it be better to keep his dreams alive than to kill them off by admitting he had failed to make them reality?

Hiccup sat up and shook his head in frustration. These thoughts were to no avail. Why couldn´t it just be like when they were younger again? Flying around on their dragons, exploring the lands and living their lives without worry? Yes, he was glad and proud to be the chief of Berk now. But sometimes he just couldn´t help wishing that he and Astrid could just go on one last exploration flight together. And maybe that´d be the ideal time to tell her how he really felt... On the other hand - why would they do that? There was nothing left to explore in the area and there was no real reason to explore any further... he really needed to stop daydreaming and man up.

 _I wish for lingering glances  
Fairytale romances  
Every single day  
And you look at me and say  
I'm your best friend every day  
But I wish for something, wish for something more_

Hiccup lifted himself into a seating position and stood up. Enough faineance, his duties were calling.

As he strode back towards the town of Berk, a worried-looking Gobber came scampering towards him. 'What´s the matter?'

'The boat´s 'ave just come in 'n they say there´s less fish 'an usual.'

Hiccup frowned. 'Why is that?'

''ey dun' 'no. 'ere´s just less 'an usual.'

'So little we need to worry about not being able to feed all of Berk and our Dragons?', Hiccup asked.

'Nah. Nat yet. But it´s strange, dun't ya think?'

'Then let´s just assume they hit some unlucky fishing spots today. I´m sure the yield will be as large as it usually is tomorrow.'

Deep inside, Hiccup was far more worried than he acted. If they didn´t catch enough fish, their dragons would grow tired and weak soon, causing them to catch even less fish in the aftermath. He didn´t dare imagine what would happen if they´d have to start relying entirely on fishing nets again with so many mouths to feed. But Gobber didn´t have to know that. A town full of panicking Vikings was the last Hiccup needed right now.

He made his way back to the town´s center. Some people were visibly worried; it seemed the fishermen had spread their news faster than he had hoped. He considered holding calling a town meeting and trying to calm them down, but decided he´d rather not because he himself didn´t really know anything about the issue. If he called a meeting and the town folk got the impression he had no idea how to tackle this problem, the worry would only spread faster.

After checking the people´s mood, Hiccup followed Gobber into the Smithy. After his father´s death, he had overcome his initial reluctance and let Gobber teach him how to be a good blacksmith. Therefore, he had now become quite a lot like his father: Spending his 'free time' working in the smithy, trying to provide the Vikings of Berk with whatever metal work they wished for.

However, the smithery had evolved over the last years - mainly because of the exchange with other Viking tribes. Metal had become a far more usual sight in the Viking´s lives. They no longer only used it for dragon seats and in catapults; instead it could now also be found in nearly every house in the form of cutlery and pots as well as in form of fireproof boxes in which they kept their valuables to make sure those were safe in the case of an _accident_ with one of the younger dragons.

Hiccup didn´t think much while he forged metal. He just concentrated on what he was doing and banished all other thoughts from his mind. It was better that way - after all, a lack of concentration could cause serious injuries when handling burning hot metal. It also helped him forget his worries for a few hours, though he would never admit how much of a relief that was to him.

And so Hiccup spent the rest of the day in the smithy, hammering metal, never looking up. Not to admire the crimson sunset and not when Gobber left. He was completely caught up in his work. Finally, as the last bits of crimson vanished from the evening sky, he let the piece he was working on cool down and made his way home.

The house he and Astrid inhabited was a comparably simple, but comfy hut, and built in a very nice surrounding, too. It was perched atop a cliff and looked quite picturesque in the moonlight. Not too large, but not too small either. One floor, three rooms. A larger one pointing towards the middle of the island where they cooked and ate, a room in which they slept - with a window over each of their beds through which they could marvel at the view - and an outhouse in which they answered nature´s callings.

He entered the house and noticed that Astrid had already gone to sleep. The moon shone through the windows, so Hiccup didn´t bother to light a torch since the flickering light might wake her up. However, there was lukewarm dinner on the table for him.

He sat down and ate in silence.

Hiccup didn´t want to, but he couldn´t help feeling lonely in this dimly lit, cold room. He wasn´t mad at Astrid for going to sleep without him - after all, it was pretty late and he was sure she had worked hard all day - but he also couldn´t help wishing she would be there with him, lighting and warming the room with her presence. Without her, it was so quiet that he could hear himself chew and breathe far too loudly, making him feel like an intruder, a burglar, a thief in the night.

After he had finished, Hiccup stood up and laid the cutlery in the sink. He felt bad for not having thanked Astrid for her work for several days in a row. And she would probably be up and out of the house before he even woke up tomorrow... With a look of resignation on his face, he undressed and readied himself for bed. He laid down on his bed, tucked his cover over himself, cast a last, longing gaze at Astrid´s beautiful face in the moonlight, and closed his eyes.

The next morning, Hiccup woke up in a matter of seconds. He had no time to roll around in bed for hours - after all, he was now chief of Berk. He stood up, stretched his body and got dressed in a matter of minutes. The sun had already moved above the horizon by quite a bit and was shining through the window of the kitchen as he gulped down his breakfast with great haste. After leaving his home, he went straight for Valka´s house. Like almost every day since he became chief, he met with her and Gobber to discuss what had to be done over the course of the day, how the trade with other tribes was going, how much food they had, whether any of the townspeople or dragons had become sick and many other issues. Of course, Valka didn´t exactly have any more chiefing experience than Hiccup, but Gobber was usually able to help them, and he valued her advice anyways.

Valka seemed rather unconcerned by how little fish they had caught yesterday. She told Hiccup that the boats had already left for today and that the fishermen had been in good spirits, eager to make up for the loss. She also reported that all major things were well in Berk, so there was not much to do for Hiccup except work in the smithy like he often did.

When the meeting was over, Hiccup considered going to look for Astrid but dropped the idea because he concluded she wouldn´t be happy about being disturbed in her work. It just wasn´t the right opportunity. Maybe tomorrow. Or someday else.

He spent most of the day in the smithy, concentrating on being a good chief and fulfilling the village´s people´s wishes and not worrying about anything else too much. However, his routine was abruptly interrupted when a group of people came storming in to the smithy in the late afternoon. Hiccup winced in surprise and nearly burnt his hand. He looked up at the intruders and had the intention to scold them at first, but decided not to when he noticed the worried, panic-stricken looks on their faces. Instead, he asked what their concern was.

Still panting, they reported that the fishing boats had just come back and their nets had almost been entirely empty. Highly concerned, Hiccup laid the saddle he was working on down and ran outside to see for himself. The late afternoon sun shone its crimson light on the scene: What seemed like the whole population of Berk was assembled on the central plain, circled around the fishermen and what little fish they had been able to catch.

Hiccup knew he had to calm the people down if he wanted to avert a panic. He thought for a minute or two, climbed on a rock and called the people´s attention towards him with a loud shout. He cleared his throat and let his gaze wander over his people´s faces, trying to interpret their expressions. Then he began to speak:

'People of Berk, I know you may be worried about and distressed by the decrease in the number and weight of fish we caught, but there is no reason for panic. Valka, Astrid and me will hold an emergency meeting right after this announcement in order to figure out how to deal with this phenomenon. Results will be announced in the early morning tomorrow.'

There was a slight murmuring as not everyone seemed to be fully satisfied with this statement, but at least the crowd dissolved. Knowing there was no time to waste, Hiccup immediately headed towards Valka´s home again.

Valka had already informed Astrid and Gobber and they were all standing at a table, their heads bent over a map, when Hiccup arrived. Valka got to the point immediately: 'We´ll need to have someone find the source of the problem. I´ve talked to some of the traders and it seems like none of the other tribes have got any clue about what´s going on. They´re expecting us to do something about it.'

'Why us?', Astrid interrupted.

'We´re much closer to our dragons than they are. And it´s obvious that the ones that can fly should be the ones to start an investigation.'

'Okay. Go on.'

'I suggest whoever we send out should fly in expanding spirals so he or she can cover as much area as possible in as little time as possible. We´ve got some fish in stock, but it´ll only last one week, two if we limit ourselves. We need to have a solution by then or there´ll be a famine.'

Hiccup nodded gravely, displaying he understood how dire the situation was.

'I´ll go and explore', Astrid said.

Valka nodded approvingly. 'Yes, you do have all the necessary skills. Cleverness, Strength, Alertness...'

'Can I join her?', Hiccup interrupted, trying to hide just how eager he was to go on an adventure with Astrid.

Valka didn´t seem to notice. 'Why?'

'Well, um... I guess... I´m the representative of our tribe, so... shouldn´t I be there in case we need to negotiate with anybody?'

'Why would you have to negotiate with somebody? We´ve already asked the other tribes and they don´t know anything. There´s no indication that this problem is caused by something we´d need to negotiate with.'

'Erm...' Hiccup was visibly lost for words. 'Well... you never know!'

It was only then that it dawned on Valka that Hiccup mainly wanted to spend some extra time with Astrid - and she decided to give in. 'Okay, if you want. You´re chief, after all, so you´re the one to decide. I´ll take care of the town with Gobber in the meantime.'

Hiccup couldn´t help but let a wide smile creep onto his face at the thought. Finally - the chance he´d been waiting for! 'It´s settled then. We´ll pack some things and food for a week, then leave tomorrow in the early morning. There´s no time to waste!'

Valka and Astrid nodded in agreement, then they all left and headed for their homes. Hiccup wished he could grab Astrid´s hand and intertwine his fingers with hers as they walked side by side, but he couldn´t build up the courage to do it. As the sun set, they reached their little house, entered it and began to pack some clothes wordlessly. For some reason, Astrid seemed tense. Hiccup drew in air with the intention of speaking several times, but he never did. He just didn´t know what to say.

After they had packed, she began to make dinner. Hiccup sat down at the kitchen table and turned towards her. After a while, he asked: 'Is there anything I can do to help you?'

'Not really. You´ve never made food before, have you?'

'No.'

There was silence once again.

'How have you been doing lately?', Hiccup started again, hoping to get a conversation going.

'Fine.'

Hiccup started to get the feeling Astrid didn´t really want to talk. But why?

'You´re not exactly talkative today, huh?'

'No.'

What was up with her? Was she mad because he had hardly talked to her during the past weeks?

Hiccup remembered he hadn´t thanked her for running the household yet.

'Um... I´m really sorry I haven´t really talked to lately. You´re doing all the chores while I´m always in the smithy or laying around lazily and... I really wanted to thank you. It´s really nice.'

Astrid just nodded to show she had heard what he said.

 _God, that was the lamest 'thank you' ever_ , Hiccup thought to himself. How was he ever going to win her affection this way?

There was another moment of silence only broken by the sizzling of fat in the frying pan. Then Astrid lifted said frying pan, brought it over to the table and put some fish on each of their plates. Afterwards, she took the cutlery from the cupboard and spread it.

 _Dang, I could have at least done that much_ , Hiccup realized, feeling awful for his tardiness.

Astrid sat down and they began to eat.

It was delicious, as it usually was. Hiccup paused and rubbed his belly exaggeratedly. 'Yum! This is really good.' When Astrid didn´t answer at first, he added : 'You´re really awesome.'

 _Oh come on, Hiccup! Now you´re just being childish._

But the gesture put a little smile on Astrid´s face as she looked down on her plate. 'It´s really nothing. You do your job, I do mine', she mumbled.

Hiccup was electrified. He had made her smile! That may have just been the first tiny, tiny step, but at least it was a step towards the right direction.

When they were finished, Hiccup helped Astrid clean the dishes. Afterwards they went to bed and for the first time in what felt like a way too long time, Hiccup didn´t feel the urge to look at Astrid´s peaceful, sleeping face - because he was sure he´d create many more opportunities for himself to see her smile in the future.

The next day began early and busy. Hiccup and Astrid ate breakfast before the sun rose and afterwards had a quick talk with Valka, who offered to explain their plan to the people of Berk once they awoke. Then they were ready to go. Hiccup fastened his bags around Toothless´ back, Astrid fastened hers around Stormfly´s. Then they mounted their dragons and lifted off into the orange light of the rising sun. They circled higher and higher, finally took one last glance at the little island that was their home, and flew off.

This was exactly what Hiccup had needed: The rush of air around his head, the feeling of freedom in his heart. He smiled widely and looked over to Astrid. From what he could see, she was enjoying herself just as much.

'This is awesome!', he shouted.

Astrid smiled at him and laughed.

After a few hours, they spotted a small island that wasn´t on the map they had taken with them. By itself, this wasn´t very peculiar, there might have still been some islands they had simply overseen up until now. But given the circumstances, Astrid and Hiccup decided to land and investigate anyways. Every irregularity they came across might turn out to be a clue.

They landed on a meadow on the south side of the island. From the air, they had seen that the isle had the shape of an oval, maybe three hundred meters from West to East and seven hundred from North to South. The south half was mostly made up of bare rock and some grasslands, the North half was covered by untouched jungle, only interrupted by what had seemed like a small lake. Since there didn´t seem to be anything of interest on the plains in the South, Hiccup and Astrid soon decided to leave their dragons to relax on the plains and enter the jungle.

Astrid led the way, cutting lianas off with a blunt knife she had brought with her. Hiccup followed behind her and couldn´t help but marvel at her skill. Even though it was still rather early in the morning, it was pretty hot in the jungle and Astrid was only wearing her usual shoulder armor and belt, but no fur collar, so she looked even more like the fierce viking fighter she was. It was incredible. After being in his daily routine for so long, Hiccup had nearly forgotten how... badass she actually was. There simply was no other word to describe her. He wondered what it would feel like to be entangled in those strong, muscular arms, to be clutched by them, pressed against this perfect, buff body...

Hiccup´s face turned as red as glowing metal at these thoughts. Thankfully, Astrid wasn´t looking at him, or he wouldn´t have been able to blame his sweating on the heat. She was keeping her gaze fixed forward, completely focused on the task at hand. Amazing. And maybe - maybe this was the time for him to make a move. Wasn´t this what he had been waiting for? Some time with her alone? _Come on_ , he urged himself. _Go for it. Now or never. Don´t mess it up. Think the words through, speak with confidence_. He sped up his pace in order to catch up to Astrid, who had gained a lead of a few meters. He reached speaking distance, raised his voice -

\- and stumbled. His leg prosthesis had gotten caught in a tree root while he wasn´t paying attention to where he was going. His face hit Astrid´s lower back, then, as she jumped away in surprise, the ground. Fortunately - or perhaps: unfortunately? - he didn´t collapse onto stony ground or other tree roots, but onto a muddy spot which softened the impact. However, it also caused his face and his hair to become completely covered in mud. He could have face palmed so hard. This was exactly the opposite of good. Astrid would think he was stupid now...

It could have been worse: Hiccup´s dragon-riding suit had been spared. Dragon saliva was already to wash off it, but mud was a completely different league. But that wasn´t really what he was worrying about while he carefully pushed himself back to his feet. He was a mess. Why had he ran up to Astrid? If he had stumbled a few meters behind her, she might not even have noticed. Now she would tease him forever. Why couldn´t he just sink into the muddy ground and vanish? It would have been way better than having to stand the humiliation of having to look Astrid in the eye after this...

But to Hiccup´s surprise, Astrid didn´t laugh. She didn´t even tease him. Instead... she looked _worried_.

'A-Are you okay?', she asked, putting a hand on his shoulder, glancing at him caringly with those wonderful blue eyes of hers.

'Y-y-yes', Hiccup said, stuttering. He tried to smile, but suddenly, there were tears in his eyes and they just started running and ran and ran and ran and there was nothing he could do about it. He felt so pathetic. This wasn´t like him at all! He wasn´t a crybaby!

Now Astrid looked even more concerned. She moved a bit closer to him and put both her arms around his neck, patting his back comfortingly. 'It´s okay. Let it all out.'

Hiccup didn´t know how long they stood this way, embracing each other as the mud hardened in his hair and the rivers of tears that were emerging from his eyes slowly ran dry. Then they separated, but Astrid still kept her hand on his shoulders.

'Now let´s find a place to wash off that mud and calm down, okay? Then you can tell me what´s wrong.'

Hiccup tried to say something, but all he got out were faint sobs. After a few miserable attempts, he decided to just nod.

Astrid took his arm with both hands and led him in the general direction of the lake they had seen from their dragons. His body was still shook by heavy sobs every now and then.

After a few minutes, the forest lightened and the lake came into view. Astrid led Hiccup, who still had to keep his eyes squeezed to avoid too much mud touching them, to the shore and helped him kneel down. Then she bent down, scooped up some water with her right hand and drank it.

'Sweet water. You´re safe to go.'

Hiccup took a deep breath and plunged his head into the cold water. He could feel the mud come off as he rubbed his hair and his face with his hands. When he could no longer hold his breath, he surfaced and gasped for air. Astrid was looking at him sympathetically. 'So, do you want to tell me what´s bothering you?'

Hiccup, his face still distorted by the shock of cold water, his hair hanging from his head like a mop and his teeth chattering, nodded. He took a few deep breaths and began:

'I-I-I-want-t-tedtotelly-y-youth-th-thaty-y-you´reamaz-z-zingandth-th-that I totallyad-d-doreyoubut I st-st-stumbledandnow I´mh-h-holdingyoubackand I-I-I´msuchani-i-idiot...', he began to babble out unintelligibly.

Astrid put a finger on his mouth, silencing him. She smiled. 'How about you calm down a bit first? Let´s walk back to the plains. I have a towel and covers in my bag so you can dry your hair and warm up.'

Once again, Hiccup couldn´t manage to do anything but nod shakily.

Sometime later, they sat in the sun on a slope on the south side of the island, Hiccup snuggled in a bunch of covers and Astrid half-sitting, half-laying beside him. A soft breeze was blowing, playing with her hair and drying Hiccup´s. They had let Stormfly and Toothless loose - partly because they could scan the area by themselves, but mostly because the two dragons were eager to fly freely after hardly leaving Berk, only for fishing trips, for months. Toothless had to stay near the ground because of his still-injured tailfin, but he enjoyed himself anyways.

'So. What was the matter?', Astrid asked.

Hiccup had to visibly force himself to stay calm, but he managed. 'I´m not sure where to begin... You know, this reaches a while back and it´s a pretty long story.'

'Just start from the very beginning', Astrid suggested with a smirk.

'Okay. So - you remember when I asked you to move in with me? I was so nervous that day because I thought we would really start... getting closer, you know? Because you might have not noticed, but... I´ve really liked you ever since... well, always, really... and I´ve always enjoyed it when you kissed me playfully, but... it feels like you didn´t really return my affection towards you. And I totally understand that, after all, I´m just a loser with a prosthetic leg... I´ve been wanting to tell you how I feel for so long but I never found a way to bring it up. So, yeah... I love you, Astrid. I really do.'

There was a long silence. Astrid stared out onto the sea, where a few birds were circling through the air. The only sounds were the wind and the water lapping against the shore.

'Astrid?', Hiccup asked after a while.

'Hiccup, you know, you really are a special case', Astrid began. 'For all these months I´ve been waiting. Waiting for you to make a move. I always thought you didn´t want to rush it, that you wanted to take things slow. That´s why I put two separate beds in the living room. But I should have known. I should have known you wouldn´t make a clear move. I noticed you´ve been dropping little hints every now and then, but.. No man has ever waited for a woman to make a move on him in the history of our tribe, you know?'

'Well, no man has ever tried to befriend a dragon in the history of our tribe before, either', Hiccup replied with a sad smile on his face.

Astrid let out a rough chuckle. 'Yeah. I guess one can´t apply any of our standards to you.'

Hiccup was unsure what to say now. 'So... you actually like me back?', he asked nervously.

'Yes, of course, you silly boy!', Astrid shouted and jostled his shoulder. 'Don´t always worry so much!'

Despite Astrid´s encouragement, Hiccup still seemed nervous thinking about all the possibilities that Astrid´s statement brought with it. Was this a permission to... touch her? Caress her cheek with his fingers? Or maybe hug her? Perhaps even - Hiccup blushed at the mere thought of it - kiss her?

After a few seconds, he asked: 'So... c-c-can we... hug on it?'

'Of course!', Astrid shouted as she pulled him in. They ended up in a somewhat clumsy position since they were both sitting on the ground and half a meter or so apart from each other, so they untangled and laid down not long later. Then Astrid rolled over and hugged Hiccup from the side, resting her head upon his chest, listening to his heartbeat and feel it rise and fall slowly.

Hiccup closed his eyes and took slow, steady breaths. Astrid loved him. She was embracing him this very moment. What he had been wishing for for so long had suddenly come true. He almost suspected he was dreaming, but it just felt far too good to be created by his imagination.

However, his bliss didn´t last long.

Stormfly and Toothless were coming back from their search, and judging from the way they behaved, they had found something. Something that even they seemed to be scared of. They were screeching in utter panic and urged Astrid and Hiccup to get on their backs as quickly as possible.

But what could be so terrifying it would scare a dragon?


	2. Unmarked

_'Go and join the army'  
Said the father to his son  
'See the world around you boy  
And learn to use a gun  
Think you're something special?  
Well, we'll make you just the same  
There's nothing wrong in dying  
After all, it's just a game'  
\- It's just a game._

Tarkan cursed the very day of his birth. Oh, what was he thinking - birth! 'Creation' was a far more fitting term. He hadn´t been born, he had been created. Created as a tool to fulfill a purpose.

And maybe, if he had just been a bit more like the others, he would have been able to fulfill this sole purpose of his without fear, without scruple, without hesitation. But he couldn´t. He just couldn´t.

For the first few years of his life, everything had been perfect. He had crawled out of his tank, had learnt to eat and drink by himself, had learnt to communicate and finally begun to attend the training.

Tarkan had been a model student. Both diligent and cunning, he had mastered every test and for a blissful, though brief time, he had earned every tester´s praise and appreciation. He had often longingly remembered scenes from that time whenever he had had the time to sit by himself, philosophize and indulge in self-pity.

However, as Tarkan climbed up the rankings further and further, more and more testers had suspected there might be something wrong with him. Maybe an unintended side effect of the new mix of nourishing fluids they had used on him? Probably. For a while, there was uncertainty about how they would deal with the situation. Would they just treat him like everyone else and see how he´d develop? Or would they decide the risk was too big and just kill him off?

They did neither. Instead, when it was decided that Tarkan was too much of a risk. he was put into a sort-of-cell. He was not allowed to have any contact to others of his kind, but he was comparably free to do whatever he wanted. But that was his problem: He didn´t know what he wanted. He thought that perhaps he should have been delighted he wouldn´t be forced to do anything he didn´t like, but for some reason, he wasn´t. Maybe because he had no way to occupy himself in a satisfying way. Of course, his creators had made sure he had access to all the technical entertainment gadgets every other student was allowed to use, but those were nothing but time wasters to him.

Only when the war entered a 'critical phase', as his superiors had liked to call it, they remembered Tarkan. He was put back into training for a few days, then immediately sent to combat. However, his ship was ambushed, damaged, and now he was stuck here, in the middle of an uncharted island amidst an uncharted sea on an uncharted planet with little hope of ever being able to leave it again.

The others that had been on his ship were little solace. They weren´t like him, couldn´t understand him. Couldn´t understand why he had kept asking why there was a war and what had caused it, couldn´t understand why he kept wondering whether the fact that his creators had created and fostered him really obliged him to support them for all his life. They couldn´t understand why he had tried to run away.

Couldn´t understand why he didn´t want to kill.

His whole organism had been designed for one single task - and he refused to fulfill it. His skin was hard as stone, his four legs so strong they made him a deadly predator. His stomach was capable of extracting nutrients from nearly every source to allow him to survive even in the harshest environments. His three eyes granted him three-dimensional vision in a sharpness his creators could only dream of, his senses of smell and vision were sharper than those of most animals. To aid him in combat, he had two brains: An ordinary brain and a plotting brain. The former allowed him to feel pain and act instinctively like most other intelligent creatures could, the latter allowed him to think rationally at incredible speeds, to adapt to changing environments in a matter of split seconds, calculating the paths of projectiles faster than they could fly and planning out potential evasive maneuvers while also granting him a nearly impeccable memory.

Tarkan guessed he should probably be happy with the situation. It seemed like he would at least be able to live in peace here. Yes, he would be isolated again, but he was used to it by now. At least his comrades didn´t bully him for being different. They just took nearly no interest in him at all. Unlike Tarkan, they desperately hoped there was a way to get off this planet. But their chances weren´t exactly great. Most of the technical equipment they had had with them was either completely broken or severely damaged. And while they did receive some education on how their equipment worked, it had all been constructed by their creators, and they didn´t know most of the details. On top of that, their hands were designed to fight - not to repair intricate wirings.

Luckily for him, his creators had provided Tarkan with a writing device specifically designed for his physiology and it had survived the crash. Beings of his kind usually didn´t write anything down - Why would they if they had perfect memory? - but he often felt the need to express himself through writing. He didn´t care that barely anyone read what he wrote, and that if somebody did, it was to conduct research on his psyche - he just enjoyed the feeling of accomplishment whenever he had finished a piece that satisfied him.

He was using this writing device right at this very moment. Or tried to. His stomach felt painfully empty and he was extremely exhausted. He couldn´t concentrate on anything. Since they had crashed, the planet had completed three full rotations and he hadn´t dared to eat anything since then. He had no information about the creatures that inhabited this planet and wanted to avoid killing anything, any being that perceived pain the way he did. Obviously, his comrades hadn´t understood his hesitation. They had simply begun chasing everything that moved as soon as they had landed, on land as well as in the ocean.

With an exasperated grunt, Tarkan lifted himself off the rock he was sitting on, hid his writing device under a bit of undergrowth and sprinted towards a nearby forest. He took aim, jumped and grabbed a few branches mid-air, which immediately gave way. Afterwards, he broke them into several pieces of eatable size, which he then consumed one after another. It wasn´t exactly the definition of a good meal, and it probably wasn´t nutritious either, but at least he didn´t have to hurt anybody to satisfy his hunger.

When Tarkan was finished, he decided to go visit his comrades and see what they were doing.

Vinar, Caso and Resh were standing around some piece of technical equipment they seemed to be inspecting. However, as usual, they didn´t talk or communicate in any other way. They didn´t need to. Thanks to their plotting brains, Naats - that was the name their creators had given their species - like them hardly ever had differing opinions. They were able to rationally pick out whatever strategy had the highest chance of succeeding - and there almost always was one choice that was rationally the best, even if creatures without a plotting brain weren´t able to see that. Therefore, there had been little to agree on after they had landed. All four of them had immediately calculated that if they wanted to get away from this planet, they would have to send out very unspecific distress signals that appealed to the mercy of some neutral party. It was unlikely their creators would invest the time and resources to come pick them up themselves and they definitely didn´t want to fall into the enemies´ hands, so it was better to hide what exactly they were and how they had gotten here. It had taken the four of them mere seconds to take additional data about their last known location and the political situation of the area into consideration and calculate that with their current technical equipment, their chance of being rescued during the next intergalactical standard year was about 0.38%. However, they had also concluded that if they found some kind of amplifier, some kind of antenna to strengthen their transmission, this chance would greatly increase.

Vinar, Caso and Resh had immediately begun constructing a transmitting station in order to send that distress signal after they had crashed. Tarkan, on the other hand, had let his ordinary brain decide it wasn´t worth the effort. Even if they were rescued, they would end up back in combat sooner or later. He would rather settle down on an unknown planet and have no impact on the universe at all than go back to combat and... still have no impact. That was one of the things Tarkan had always failed to understand: Why were so many of his kind, who were able to think so rationally in some situations, unable to realize that being a soldier in a war that had been raging for generations now would not allow them to have any more impact on the universe than just living peaceful lives? Nobody would ever make a difference by continuing the violence!

But no other Naat had ever questioned his creators. They were all perfect soldiers, just like they were intended to be. Their creators told them there was a war they needed to win, and they all believed it. Tarkan was the only one who ever wanted to find out more about their enemies and why they and his creators were fighting. After all, there didn´t seem to be any real reason for armed conflict. Both parties seemed to be wealthy enough to keep building new spaceships for every single one that was destroyed, so a lack of goods was surely not the cause. Their enemies needed nitrogen and methane to survive, they and their creators mainly oxygen, so territorial quarrels couldn´t have caused it, either.

Whenever Tarkan had asked any of his instructors about the war, they just told him it was none of his business and he should shut up. But it was his business! If he was supposed to die in a what, didn´t he have a right to at least know what he had been fighting for?


	3. Comfort

**Author´s notes:**

 **At Guest: No. I just thought 'companions' sounded too Dr. Who-ish and 'buddies' or 'co-workers' weren´t really fitting for people you go on a space ship with. If you have a better term, let me know and I will consider it.**

 **During the following weeks, I will go on vacation, meaning I won´t be able to continue releasing one chapter per week. But I have put up a tumblr queue that will do it for me - it just won´t be on this site. You can find aforementioned queue here:**

 **It will even release the 4th Chapter just one day from now!**

* * *

Hiccup and Astrid got up in a hurry and scrambled onto their dragon´s backs. It took longer than usual because Stormfly and Toothless refused to keep still, but eventually they managed. Still, they were deeply unsettled. What could have scared the dragons so much?

All thoughts about Astrid were wiped from Hiccup´s mind by now. This was a dangerous situation, he couldn´t risk lowering his concentration to indulge in romantic fantasies.

After a few minutes of flight, another island came into sight. It looked unsuspicious at first, but as they flew nearer and were able to make out more and more details, Astrid could only stop an agonized screech by pressing both her hands on her mouth.

A long stretch of land was entirely black, seemingly scorched by an unidentifiable cause. Dented and twisted pieces of metal lay along and beside it, underlining the impression of total devastation. But that wasn´t what had made Toothless and Stormfly so nervous, or was it?

It wasn´t.

Not long after, they found the source of both their dragons´ panic.

Several _beings_ of incomprehensible size were moving around the island with equally incomprehensible speed. Their heavy bodies let the ground shake with every stride they took, and their dark green, scaled skins left no doubt that everything that got in the way of one of these beasts would be crushed by their momentum. Their whole appearance was fear-inducing: Their three-and-a-half-meter-long, two-meter-high, egg-shaped bodies, their three eyes and their muscular legs all seemed to serve no other purpose than to kill.

And kill they did.

No matter which poor animal they spotted - it was mercilessly chased down, cornered and shredded alive. Then these creatures opened a gap in the front third of their bodies that seemed to be their mouth and gobbled large chunks of raw meat and bones with a single gulp.

Hiccup and Astrid had no doubt that these... things would easily be capable of reducing the area´s fishing resource noticeably. And while they did not yet have proof that they actually were the cause of their problem, they quickly agreed that it was time to go back to Berk, report and come back with reinforcements. It would have been suicide to land and try to investigate without any protection.

The sun was already setting when they returned to Berk. As soon as they landed, people came storming towards them and bombarded them with questions. Hiccup and Astrid had to push quite hard to make the crowd part, and they were relieved when they finally arrived at Valka´s house and were able to lock the door behind them. It was obvious they had to keep what they had seen a secret from the general public. It was too strange, too unbelieveable, too frightening.

After they had made sure nobody was listening on the door anymore, Astrid began to report what they had discovered. To Hiccup´s relief, she did not mention his 'accident' on the first island at all. His face would probably have overheated.

But as Astrid came to the point of their discovery, Valka didn´t seem to believe them at first. She kept asking them whether they were really sure of what they had seen. After all, they had kept quite a large distance and therefore hadn´t been able to really make out that many details. Besides, nothing like such creatures had ever been spotted on Berk - where should they have come from all of a sudden? And if they were so strong, why hadn´t they spread to other islands?

After a while, even the two explorers became uncertain. Had their minds played a trick on them? But Toothless and Stormfly had been scared as well...

When Valka noticed this, she decided to disband the meeting. 'Maybe the two of you should sleep over it. It´s been a very long, stressful day and you had to leave your normal routines without any warning. No wonder you´re a little disordered. But that´s nothing a good night´s sleep can´t fix.'

Relieved, Hiccup and Astrid grabbed their bags and left. Valka escorted them to the door and stayed outside for a while, enjoying the cooling evening air and the play of colors in the sky. She smiled. Astrid´s hand had reached out for Hiccup´s when they had left. She wasn´t sure, but she couldn´t recall Hiccup and Astrid ever walking hand in hand during the last years. Maybe Hiccup had finally gotten over his initial anxiety. Maybe her little boy was growing up after all.

Hiccup felt a touch against his fingers and looked down in surprise. Was this an offer? Blushing, he intertwined his fingers with Astrid´s and looked towards the orange evening sun. He didn´t want her to see his reddened cheeks.

They climbed over a few rocks leading towards their home. Neither of them said anything. Hiccup was still unsure about what the coming night was going to bring, and he didn´t want to ruin the moment by asking.

When they arrived, Astrid suggested that he could move their beds beside each other if he wanted while she made dinner. Once again, he was thankful for the relative darkness in their home, as it hid his horrendously violet face. But he agreed.

After they had eaten, Hiccup went to the bathroom to change into his pajamas and brush his teeth. When he got out, Astrid gifted him a smile and went to change herself.

Nervously, Hiccup laid down on his side of the bed and rolled over to face the wall. What would happen now? Were they doing to... make love now? But he didn´t know how! He wasn´t ready for any of this! What if he messed up? What if Astrid didn´t want to be with him anymore because of that?

His thoughts raced as the last glimpse of light vanished from the bedroom. He heard Astrid emerge from the bathroom in the dark. His heart was racing, cold sweat was forming on his forehead, Goosebumps covering his whole body. What was he supposed to do? Nobody had ever prepared him for this! The mattress behind him squeaked quietly as weight was put onto it, he could hear Astrid shuffling with her cover. Maybe he should ask her what she expected of him? But wouldn´t that make him look even more stupid?

Suddenly, he felt hands touching his back.

One was nudging its way under his side, the other was moving around him, pausing when it met with the over on his chest. Then, Astrid´s voice whispering right behind his ear: 'Are you okay? You seem uneasy...'

But all of a sudden, Hiccup couldn´t recall ever being more okay before. All the worry was suddenly swept away. 'Y-Y-Yes, don´t worry', he said, turning his head towards her as far as he could. Her lips brushed his cheek lightly, then she pulled his chest towards hers.

Hiccup was entirely engulfed in her warmth. He could feel her warm, comforting lips kiss his ear, her soft breasts against his neck, her strong legs entangled with his. He closed his eyes and relaxed, trying to ignore the undeniable bulging in his pants.

However, that proved to be more difficult than he had hoped. What if she noticed? He really didn´t want to make this situation awkward again...

But it seemed Astrid didn´t mind. He heard her chuckle. 'Don´t worry, it´s normal', she whispered before going back to tracing her lips around his neck and his ear.

For a few seconds, there was silence only broken by their slow, peaceful breaths. Then, Hiccup murmured: 'Can we stay like this forever, please?'

Astrid chuckled again. 'I think not. But I wish we could, too.'

Hiccup took a deep breath.

'I love you, Astrid.'

'I love you too, Hiccup.'

The young viking lay awake for a few more minutes, thinking about how lucky he was to have found a girl like Astrid. It was incredible how she managed to show off what a tough Viking she was every day and still maintain her soft, emotional core. And while he was the guy who was more intelligent and rational in most situations, there were so many things he didn´t know anything about. She seemed to be willing and able to help him out with these things without asking for anything in return. They were a great team.

Everything was going to be alright.

When Astrid and Hiccup arrived in the town center the next morning - the fact that they were walking hand in hand had caused several interjections of surprise among the people on the way there - Valka was already busy deploying a team of reinforcements that would support Astrid and Hiccup in case they needed to engage in battle. She had picked out some of the strongest and most brutal man Berk had to offer, as seemed fit for the occasion.

Hiccup, however, wasn´t too happy about this. What if these people didn´t obey him? Yes, he was their chief and they probably respected him, because they usually acknowledged that his decisions were wise. But what if their group got into a situation where they trusted their own intuition more than Hiccup's? Where they panicked? After all, they were still Vikings, and Vikings generally didn´t like obeying orders...

On the other hand, he had Astrid with him, who could protect him and underline his authority with her physical strength. It probably would be alright as long as she was with him.

Valka was talking about all the tournaments and trophies each of these people had won, but Hiccup wasn´t really paying attention. He wasn´t sure why, but for some reason, he didn´t think any having won fighting trophies was going to help anybody deal with these... beasts. They were too large, too strong to be beaten by a single human. No, if they wanted to capture one of these creatures, they´d have to use their wit. And if wit was needed, it was usually him who had to come up with a plan.

Around midday, they all mounted their dragons and took off. Toothless and Stormfly had no trouble finding their way back to the island, so they led the way.

When they arrived, they formed a large circle formation and flew around the island in large rounds. Hiccup and Astrid hadn´t been imagining anything: These strange, fear-inducing beings were still there. Right now, several of them were standing in a circle around what seemed to be the very bloody corpse of a deer, taking turns in ripping chunks of meat out of it. Their reinforcements, very confident when they had left Berk, looked rather unsettled and perhaps even frightened now that they saw this brutal, savage behavior by themselves. How little morale did one have to have to ravage an animal, especially one that was as gracious and harmless as a deer, like this?

After everyone had gotten a good look at the situation, the group turned towards another nearby island and landed there to debate.

'You can´t seriously expect us to fight these things!', one of the fighters exclaimed. 'You´ve got to be crazy! They´ll rip us apart!'

'Calm down, calm down', Hiccup interrupted. 'I won´t force any of you to do anything you don´t want to. Therefore: is anyone of you still willing to serve as our escort?'

There was silence. Hiccup looked around and saw nothing but embarrassed and uneasy faces.

'Just like I thought.'

After another while of silence, he added: 'Listen, guys, I know you´ve come all this way, but there´s no use in fighting if we aren´t confident, and I don´t really think we can do anything about this issue with brute force. If we can´t beat these creatures by strength, we´re going to have to beat them by wit. It might be better if you just return to Berk and do whatever you would normally do right now.'

Astrid wanted to object, but Hiccup told her he knew what he was doing and he´d explain once these brutes had left.

'What in the world was that?', Astrid asked a bit later, visibly aggravated. 'We´re exactly where we were yesterday! You are aware that we only have a week to solve this problem and two days of it are almost over?'

'Yes, of course. Now calm down. What do you think would have happened if I had commanded an attack? Didn´t you see how scared these people were? It would have been chaotic! The most likely outcome would have been that our warriors return home beaten and battered and that these creatures would´ve become angry at us for attacking them. A far worse situation than the one we´re now in.'

Astrid couldn´t argue with that. 'Okay...', she admitted. 'You´re probably right. But what are you planning to do now?'

'I´m not sure. I´ve been thinking and... maybe these beings are just like dragons.'

'Hiccup, these things are _nothing_ like dragons. They don´t even have wings', Astrid interrupted in a matter-of-fact-fashion.

Hiccup let out a short chuckle. 'I didn´t mean it literally, you silly. I was trying to say: What if there´s a way to communicate with them?'

'How are you going to talk to them? All they do is grunt.'

'All _dragons_ do is grunt.'

Astrid laughed curtly. 'Ha, you got me on that one.' After a moment, she added: 'Okay, maybe you´re right. Perhaps we should take that option into consideration. But how are you going to start?'

'The only way there is.'

Not long after, Hiccup was slowly walking towards one of those giants, both his empty hands raised and stretched out. He hoped this was a universal gesture to signal you meant no harm. It had worked on dragons, at the very least.

They had chosen to approach this particular one of the foreign creatures because it seemed distant from the other ones, as they had found out by watching it from the air for several hours. For all that time, it had just been sitting around on a rock, hitting some strange metal box, but with no intention of breaking it - or so it seemed. They had no clue what the being was doing and what it was actually trying to achieve. Maybe it was simply crazy and their enterprise was destined to fail right from the start.

The giant seemed to have noticed him now. It put the metal box away and looked up at him. Hiccup´s heart started racing. He had to resist the urge to run away to where Astrid was hiding.

 _Stay calm, stay calm..._


	4. Astronaut

Ah, Poetry.

It was one of Tarkan´s few escapes from the real world. It let him travel to places of unspeakable beauty, invited him to dream and showed him he wasn´t alone.

A sound made him look up. He put his tablet on the ground and directed all of his attention to the sound´s origin. Something was approaching him.

It was small, about half his size, and had 4 extremities. However, it was only walking on two; it was stretching the other pair out in front of itself, either to show it meant no harm or to be able to protect itself. Maybe a bit of both. But considering its frail body, it probably could neither pose any threat towards him nor defend itself very well.

The being was now coming closer and closer to him, beginning to waver slightly. Tarkan suspected it was scared of him. Perhaps it would help if he lowered himself to all fours so he didn´t look as threatening?

Just as Hiccup was only about 20 meters away from the giant - he had started stalking towards it from very, very far away - it got off the rock it had been sitting on, rose to its full, intimidating height, and then let itself fall onto all fours. The impact shook the ground.

 _Ohmygodohmygodohmygod it´s getting ready to charge it wants to crush me_ , Hiccup thought as he ran away in panic, not risking to look behind himself. He needed to hide! There! - A large rock, just a few meters to the right! He could jump over it and hide from the monster´s sight behind it!

Tarkan was unsure what to do. Should he approach the tiny thing and risk scaring it further? Or back off and risk it running away? He didn´t want either. No matter what kind of creature this would turn out to be, it had caught his interest. He wanted to know what it had been trying to do now.

So he just remained motionless.

When he felt it was safe, Hiccup parted his arms and cautiously looked over the rock he was hiding behind.

The monster was still there. He ducked back down immediately. What had he gotten himself into? How crazy was he to think he´d be able to reason or even communicate with this gigantic creature?

After a minute or so, Hiccup decided he wasn´t getting anywhere by just cowering more. He got up and began approaching the monster again.

After what had felt like an eternity, the two-legged being left its cover and began approaching him again painfully slowly, especially since his heightened senses let him experience time much more consciously. This was getting boring.

What was the dwarf still scared of? Didn´t it realize that if he really wanted to kill it, he would have done so by now? On the other hand, this species might not even have a plotting brain. That would explain this rather irrational behavior.

Hiccup was getting closer and closer now. His hand was less than a meter away from the giant´s skin. And it was shaking violently, just like his legs. He couldn´t recall ever being this scared before in his whole life. Vividly colored dots swirled in front of him, sweat was covering his whole body. On top of that, he suddenly felt a very pressing urge to pee.

Finally, the small, two-legged creature reached Tarkan. It laid the front of his upper right extremity in the middle of his face. Because his skin was so hard, he could barely perceive the touch, but he knew it was happening. And since he was pretty sure that the midget would be able to apply more pressure despite its feeble figure, he guessed that this gesture represented an act of kindness and not one of threat.

However, interpreting the gesture didn´t exactly help Tarkan in finding an adequate reaction. If he tried to imitate the gesture, he might break one or several of the dwarf´s bones. If he tried to communicate with his voice, it would probably not understand and might be intimidated by the volume, thinking he was letting out a battle roar.

He had done it. His hand was touching the giant´s scaled skin. And he was still alive.

Hiccup felt like jumping up and down in delight, but he was very aware that this might not be a clever idea. Who knew - maybe that would make the giant feel attacked?

For maybe a minute or so, it was just him and the giant, staring each other in the eyes, listening to each other´s breaths. Hiccup´s were short and nervous; the giant was breathing calmly and deeply.

Then Hiccup had an idea. First, he broke contact. The giant didn´t attack him. Perfect. He scurried off into the forest and searched for a large stick. Perhaps he could communicate by drawing things into the dirt? It had worked with Toothless, after all...

When he returned, he drew a stick figure into the dirt. It was harder than he had thought because his 'pencil' was so huge, but the giant needed to be able to handle it as well, after all.

As soon as he was finished, he wrote the word 'Viking beside his sketch in capital letters. Then he pointed the stick at the word and read it out loud a few times. Finally, he held it out for the giant to grab.

Tarkan grabbed the stick gladly. This midget seemed to be quite a clever one. As best as he could with his large, clumsy hands, he drew an egg-shaped body resting on four limbs and wrote the word 'NAAT' beside it. Then he said the word as quietly as he could, knowing it would still seem very loud to this 'VIKING'.

And indeed, it pressed both its upper extremities against what Tarkan suspected to be its hearing organs.

What in the world had that been? Couldn´t that thing roar a little more quiet? And... was that really the only way they communicated?

Now Hiccup wanted to know where the... 'NAAT' had come from. So he drew a sketchy map of this and a few surrounding islands. Then he linked Berk on the map to the stick figure he had drawn earlier.

This time, it took Tarkan a while to understand what the Viking was trying to say. After a while, he realized that the seemingly random lines represented this and the surrounding islands as seen from the air. Apparently the viking wanted to know where the Naats came from.

So how was he going to explain that?

After a moment of thinking, he drew a rectangle around the viking´s map, then drew a circle and a line from the map to the upper half of the circle. Then he stabbed the earth around the circle a few times, creating a few holes. Finally, he circled one of those holes and drew a line from that hole to his self-portrait. It wasn´t exactly scientifically correct since the Naats obviously didn´t live on a star, but he hoped this depiction would allow the viking to understand the concept there were creatures that lived on other planets.

Hiccup couldn´t believe what he was seeing. Could this be true? Or was he just misunderstanding something? He needed a second opinion. Therefore, he scurried away to where Astrid was hiding and told her to come. 'Hurry! I need your opinion on this!'

When he returned to where the drawings were, he explained what they meant to Astrid: 'First, I sketched myself and wrote 'viking' beside it. Then he sketched himself and wrote this - I´m assuming it´s 'Naat', but he - I´m assuming the creature is a male - just grunts, so I´m not sure how to pronounce it - beside his sketch', Hiccup gabbled.

'Are you sure that last sentence made sense? You lost me somewhere in the middle', Astrid interrupted, chuckling. 'Perhaps you should calm down down a bit.'

But Hiccup continued unflinching, if a bit slower: 'After that introduction, I asked him where he and his kind were coming from. He drew this.'

Hiccup gave Astrid a moment to look at the Naat's drawings and make her own conclusions. 'What do you think?', he asked after a while.

'Well... I´not sure, but... I´d say he´s coming from outer space', Astrid replied hesitantly.

The two vikings looked at each other for a long time.

Nobody had ever expected anything like this! Of course, yes, some vikings had once wondered whether there were other planets in space and whether they might be filled with intelligent life, but these thoughts were usually quickly abandoned as they led nowhere. Up until now, they had had no way of proving or disproving any theories concerning that issue, and often there had been more pressing problems - like fetching food and training dragons - to take care of anyways.

The two vikings seemed quite taken aback by Tarkan´s revelation. It was always that way when an intelligent species was confronted with the fact they weren´t alone in the universe - even more so when said species was far away from developing space travel itself. But it couldn´t be helped - they would have found out sooner or later anyways. He might as well be honest right away.

Even though he did not yet fully comprehend the viking´s facial expressions and gestures, it wasn´t hard to tell they had a lot of questions and didn´t know how to ask them. They were going to need a better way of communicating.

After a while of thinking, Tarkan had an idea. He picked up his pad and put it on record mode. He gestured Hiccup to say some words, stopped the record and put it on replay. The two vikings seemed alienated by the technology at first, but they soon saw the potential it had. Even if they couldn´t speak each other´s languages, Tarkan could record the words they spoke, put them in a different order and basically let his tablet speak for him.

Neither Hiccup nor Astrid had any idea what that thing the Naat was using to record their voices was or how it worked. All that mattered was that it did work. So they simply played along.

During the following time, the two vikings did their best to teach Tarkan as many words as possible, and Tarkan tried to express himself as well as he could. Soon, he had learnt what arms and legs and hands were, that the species of Vikings had two genders which were called male and female, that the two vikings were named Hiccup and Astrid, that they had two pets which belonged to the species 'dragon' and many other things.

As night approached, Hiccup and Astrid grew tired. It had been a long day. They asked the Naat to meet them in the same spot the next morning and went to find a place to sleep. Soon, they had found a comfy spot.

Toothless and Stormfly came flying towards them, having sensed it was time to go to sleep. Hiccup and Astrid took some food from the bags the dragons were still carrying and ate it. It was a meager dinner, but it was better than nothing and they needed to save as much food as possible for the days to come.

Hiccup settled down on the ground and got ready to sleep.

He half expected Astrid to hug him from behind again, but she had other things in mind that night. She lay down beside him and tapped his shoulder.

'Huh?', Hiccup asked, slightly confused.

'I want you to look me in the eye.'

Hiccup obeyed and turned around to face her.

Then she leaned in.

Before Hiccup could react, her soft, wet lips were stroking his, urging them to part. At first, he wanted to back off in surprise, but Astrid had already wrapped her hands around his sides and put her hands on top of each other between his shoulder blades.

Hiccup closed his eyes and let her touch guide him, trying his best to ignore his pulsing erection. Awful timing, once again. Was he never going to have any control over that?

Hesitantly, he wrapped his arms around her and hugged her back.

Then he could feel a hand moving upwards on his back, stroking him softly. When it reached his head, it pushed him closer toward Astrid, encouraging him to give in to her, to lose himself in her warmth.

And so he did.

He parted his lips and a tongue slid through them, curious, exploring his mouth, caressing his teeth, moving further and further until it found his tongue, entangling itself with it, spreading its taste throughout his mouth.

His nose was slammed onto her cheek softly, overflown with her smell, her beautiful smell, and engulfed in her heat.

His breaths were growing unsteady, each one more longing, more demanding than the one before, his heart racing faster and faster.

Hiccup forgot to breathe.

Then, with a sound that was half helpless moan, half longing cry, Hiccup backed away. He let himself fall onto his back and looked at the stars while his breath and heartbeat slowed bit by bit.

'Were you trying to suffocate me?', he asked a while later, a large smile covering his face.

Astrid giggled. 'Well, you seem to have enjoyed it quite a bit, considering you thought you were in mortal danger.'

Hiccup laughed. 'You literally took my breath away.'

After a while, he added: 'I´m really glad to have you with me. You´re the cleverest, funniest, quirkiest, most badass girl I know.'

Astrid blushed in the darkness. 'Thank you. I´m also glad to have you. You may not be the most badass warrior of Berk, but you´re perfect the way you are.'

Now it was Hiccup´s turn to blush.

After a while, he pointed at the sky. 'There are so many stars out there... I wonder if we´ll ever know how many kinds of creatures live out there.'

'I don´t think we´ll ever know. But I can very well imagine you discovering some of them one day.'

'Really?'

'Of course. Look how fast you´ve managed to communicate with this giant that everybody else would have just tried to kill. I´m sure you can learn a lot from these creatures.'

Hiccup seemed to not have considered that possibility up until that point. 'Wow, you may be right...'

After that, the two lay awake beside each other for a few more minutes before finally drifting into sleep.

Tarkan laid down on the bare ground to sleep. His skin was hard enough to not feel the irregular bumps in the ground, and thick enough to not need a cover to keep him warm at night. He should have felt perfectly fine the way he was.

But he didn´t.

It was hard to describe what it was that seemed to be missing. It wasn´t warmth, and it wasn´t a more comfortable bed, either. So what was it that he felt like he was missing? What was it that these two vikings had but he lacked?

He didn´t know. Or maybe he did know, somewhere deep down, but didn´t want to admit it to himself. Because he knew Naats weren´t supposed to feel lonely.

And so he lay on the grass by himself, listening to the silence of the cold night, hoping that one day he would found somebody like himself.

 _I'm deafened by the silence.  
Is it something that I've done?  
I know that there are millions -  
I can't be the only one  
Who's so disconnected.  
It's so different in my head...  
Can anybody tell me why  
I'm lonely like a satellite? _

_'Cause tonight I´m calling all astronauts  
All the lonely people that the world forgot  
If you hear my voice - come pick me up  
Are you out there? - 'Cause you´re all I´ve got_


	5. It's Time

The next day, Hiccup decided to get to the point and try to explain their problem to Tarkan - or at least he hoped this was how the creature´s name would be pronounced in human speech. In Naat-speech, it was nothing but a kind of two-part grunt.

It was the third day counting from when they had first left Berk, and considering the boats had already been bringing in less and less fish the days before, there was no time to waste.

Tarkan was at the same spot where they had met the last day, already waiting for them. The drawings that had covered the ground yesterday - there had been a lot of them - had vanished completely though.

Hiccup picked up the stick and began to draw. Luckily, communication was already a lot easier and he could write some words instead of trying to draw every single one of them.

When he was done, Tarkan let out some sort of sound that could have meant pretty much anything. Hiccup _hoped_ it signalized he was thinking, but no other gesture hinted at that. No sitting down, no scratching a chin - though, that would be impossible anyways because Tarkan had no visible chin - no resting the head on an arm - nothing at all. He just stood around in the landscape like an oddly-shaped boulder.

After a few moments, he began to move again. He grabbed his weird technology-thingy, pushed something on it for a while, then turned towards them. It played choppy, recorded bits of Hiccup´s voice from yesterday: 'I can - tell - other - Naat - problem - but - might - not - work - they - no - care - you.'

The grammar and intonation were obviously weird because Hiccup hadn´t said the words in this connection with each other, but the message was clear: He´d tell the other Naats t that they should stop eating fish, but he wasn´t sure whether they would obey him because he was an outsider and the other Naats likely didn´t care about them Vikings, or any other species that inhabited this planet

Since they didn´t have much to lose, Hiccup and Astrid decided to tell Tarkan to go for it.

The giant turned around with a swiftness one would not have expected from such huge, seemingly clumsy creatures and sped off, but turned around and waited when he realized Hiccup and Astrid couldn´t follow quite as fast.

Together, they walked for several minutes before arriving at a clearing in the woods. Three other Naats were standing and sitting around it, each one of them apparently trying to repair a different technical gadget.

Before Tarkan called their attention to him, Astrid and Hiccup decided to climb a thick tree. They weren´t sure how the other Naats would react, and neither Hiccup nor Astrid felt like being chased around the island by a group of angry giants.

When they had reached a height that they hoped would be sufficient, Hiccup held out his fist and signaled a thumbs-up to Tarkan. If he was going to teach Tarkan to understand Vikings, he might as well just teach him a few basic gestures as well.

Tarkan called everyone´s attention to him with a deafening growl. After that, the Naats gathered in a circle and let out different kinds of grunts and other unidentifiable noises one after another. After a few minutes, Astrid and Hiccup had lost all track of who was responding to whom. And of course, they didn´t know which direction the discussion was taking, anyways.

Finally, they were finished. Nothing in the way any of them walked away gave Hiccup any hint on which party had won the discussion. No hunched shoulders, no frowning foreheads... he started to wonder whether these creatures even had different facial expressions.

Tarkan gestured them to follow him out of hearing range. He sat down in order to have two of his extremities - apparently they could all be used as hands or legs, depending what the Naat needed - and began doing something on his tablet again. Hiccup, though very excited to find out how the talk had played out, managed to wait patiently and without jumping from one leg onto the other wildly, though he felt the urge to.

Eventually, Tarkan was finished arranging Hiccup´s words and let his tablet play them: 'They - no - want - eat - Yuck! - food - they - want - eat - fish - but - if - get - help - they - leave'

Hiccup took a moment to think, then wrote: 'Can we help get them help?' into the dirt.

Tarkan operated his tablet for another while, then let it speak for him: 'Need - long - metal - stick - have - no - material - no - forge'

'How long?', Hiccup wrote.

Tarkan grabbed the stick and drew a long line. Then he sketched three Naats beside it. The line was about as long as two and a half Naats were high. So the long metal stick the Naats needed would have to be about 10 meters long. Hiccup thought for a while. That should be doable with the equipment he had in his forge. But - and that was the problem - it would take time. Likely more time than they had before the people of Berk would grow hungry.

On top of that, such a huge object would need constant supervision during the process of forging it. And it would take a long time. Hiccup wasn´t sure whether he´d be able to do it in one day, and even if they decided to let Gobber know what was going on, the two of them would have to take 12-hour shifts. They couldn´t afford to lose any time by sleeping. Besides that, if anybody saw Hiccup worried or stressed out, they would become nosy and try to find out what was going on. So he had to either stay out of sight or force himself to make a calm impression. He wasn´t sure whether he´d be able to keep the facade up...

Hiccup sat down and ran his right hand through his hair. 'This isn´t going to be easy, but... I think it´s doable', he told Astrid.

Just to make sure, Hiccup wrote: 'Anything else needed?' into the dirt, but Tarkan conveyed that they could build all the other parts of the transmitting stations from the debris they had at hand and even had parts of it done already. They talked a little while more, discussing some more technical details like the stick´s diameter and whether there was anything to pay particular attention to while forging, then the two Vikings were ready to return to Berk once again. Hiccup had briefly considered taking Tarkan with them, but besides being near impossible to transport, he would scare the people of Berk, and Hiccup wanted to avoid that at all cost.

It was late afternoon when they finally arrived at Berk. Hiccup immediately ran towards the smithy to start working, asking Astrid to report their experiences to Valka.

His thoughts were racing. Their smithy wasn´t made to produce such huge parts, so he´d have to make several smaller sticks first, then connect them by melting their ends and hammering them together. And of course, each of those sticks would have to cool down before he could even start thinking about melting the ends again... it would all take so long! He couldn´t even use water to speed up the cooling process because that would obviously embrittle the material, which could lead to the whole stick breaking very easily.

Hiccup threw himself at the work, ignoring his surroundings entirely. As the sun set, he had finished the first 2-meter stick and discarded it outside the smithy to cool. At midnight, he had the second. At dawn, the third.

But the work was taking his toll on him. He hadn´t eaten anything during the past one and a half days, and he had been awake for a full one. He could feel his hands starting to shake, his movements becoming more and more weary, his vision beginning to blur a fast movements.

He didn´t like it, but he had to admit that there was no point in continuing. Luckily, as he found out on the way out, Astrid had informed Gobber, who was ready to continue his work immediately. He also insisted on guiding Hiccup to his house - 'Dunt want'ya ter stumble an' hurt yaself. Ya look awful.'

As soon as Hiccup arrived at his bed and slumped down on top of it, he fell into a long, dreamless sleep.

When he woke up again, the sun was already setting outside his window and the whole room was filled with a bright, shining red. Shocked, he jumped up and splashed cold water into his face. Their fourth day was almost gone already!

But luckily, Gobber had worked all day long and they now had five two-meter metal rods. Hiccup estimated that he´d be able to have them combined by dawn. On the other hand, he couldn´t allow himself to rush it. Of course, he didn´t know what exactly the Naats needed the stick for, but he was pretty sure that a crooked stick would be suboptimal.

After the two vikings had left, Tarkan did his best to try and convince his comrades to give the Vikings a chance. After all, they would stay stuck on this island if they didn´t accept the Vikings' help. Instead of trying to eat them just because they were weak and different, they needed to be grateful that they were so easily willing to help!

Though especially Vinar was very skeptical at first, Tarkan was able to convince the other Naats one by one. By the time the planet´s rotation caused its star to vanish behind the horizon, they agreed on eating no more fish - if the antenna the Vikings were supposed to produce would actually work.

If not, they´d just keep eating until there were no fish left...

During the night after, Tarkan sat by himself and looked at the stars. These...vikings were truly astonishing. Even though they were entirely forged by nature and had little technology, they were immediately willing to help.

Or was he just fooling himself? Were they just driven by the will to survive, by the knowledge of the fact they´d starve if they didn´t help the Naats? Like most species would be?

Tarkan didn´t know. Even though he hoped he had at least managed to come to a basic understanding of the vikings, there were so many things he still did not know. Their culture, their customs...

He didn´t know why, but for some reason, he was curious about these things. He wanted to get to know these beings. If he could, he would have liked to stay and just let his comrades leave without him. But would he have a choice?

As Hiccup let the hammer fall down onto the metal stick for the last time, the dawn began to break through the night. It was done, finally. More than two full nights and one day had gone into making it - now all they needed to do was wait for it to cool down and deliver it to the Naats.

It was the morning of the fifth day since they had first left, and their fish supply had reached a level where it was no longer possible to deny that Berk was on the brink of famine.

During the rest of the morning, Hiccup tried to get a bit of sleep since he had worked all night, but he couldn´t get comfortable no matter how long he thrashed and kicked his covers around. He was filled with dread that he might have failed as a chief. Stoick would have never let his people suffer from hunger. He would´ve just fought the Naats without hesitation. Was diplomacy really the right solution in this case?

Even if the Naats stopped eating fish immediately after they received their stick, the fishing resources wouldn´t recover immediately. Who knew how long the Naats had been diminishing it before the fishermen had even noticed anything? And what were the Naats going to eat while they waited for their rescue? Hiccup wasn´t sure, but he suspected calling for help couldn´t cause a friendly spaceship to suddenly appear out of nowhere to pick the Naats up. It would have to come here first, and who knew how long that would take? Considering how far the planets were apart, it might even take years!

Hiccup sat up and sighed in resignation. Maybe he should go see Astrid. She would cheer him up. But then again, she probably had more important things to do. He would be nothing but an inconvenience... like he had been for most of his life. Since the day Valka had first left him.

His thoughts drifted to his father. For 10 long years, Hiccup had been nothing but a huge disappointment, a huge letdown to him. Weak, lanky, clumsy, useless in any kind of fight. He could still remember the stern, emotionless look on his father´s face when Stoick told him that he no longer wanted Hiccup to be his son.

Then, after they had defeated the huge dragon together, his life had changed drastically. Suddenly, he had become the center of attention, the center of admiration. It had been an entirely new feeling to him.

Looking back, he could almost say that these were the best five years of his life. Yes, he didn´t know his mother was still alive back then, but he felt accepted by everybody and was mostly free to do whatever he felt like. Saying that he´d been free of worries would be exaggerated, but they simply seemed so much smaller than that ones he had now.

Then he met his mother, and his father died.

At first, his newly received chief status kept him busy with being proud and learning all the things a chief had to know from Gobber. But after a while, he had started feeling somewhat alone. For some reason, Hiccup just couldn´t forget that Valka had left him for 15 years without even checking whether he was still alive. There was simply no amount of hugs, no amount of times reassuring him that she really cared for him that could make that up.

Therefore, it wasn´t too hard to understand why he wished he could turn back time and relive his early teenage years - those in which his father was still alive.

But now, it was time to move on. A new challenge had arisen, and it needed his whole attention. He had no time to further dwell on the past, though he would make sure to learn from it.

 _It´s time to begin, isn´t it?_

 _I get a little bit bigger_

 _But then I´ll admit_

 _I´m just the same as I was_

 _Now don´t you understand_

 _That I´m never changing who I am_

In the afternoon, everything was finally ready. Astrid seemed to be especially eager to get going while Hiccup had blue-ish rings under his eyes - he hadn´t got any sleep for almost a day.

'Are you sure you´re ready to do this?', Astrid asked Hiccup as they walked towards their dragons.

'Yes. There´s no time to waste. And you will have the harder task anyways. We don´t know how carrying the rod will influence Stormfly´s flight dynamics. She is weaker than Toothless, but we can´t risk letting him carry it because of his injured fin.'

Astrid nodded.

They were going to take off from a cliff a good distance away from the town. Though some rumors had spread, Hiccup, Astrid and Valka had agreed that it would better to keep the people of Berk mostly uninformed for now.

Valka expected them at the cliff. 'Good luck', she said as soon as the two young adventurers came into hearing range. She moved a few steps towards Hiccup and hugged him tightly. Hiccup closed his eyes and gave in to the hug.

After a moment, he pulled back and mounted his dragon.

In the meantime, Valka turned to Astrid and put a hand on her shoulder. 'Be careful, okay? And make sure Hiccup doesn´t get himself into trouble.'

Astrid smiled and nodded. 'I promise I will.'

As soon as Stormfly swung herself into the air, the rod began swinging wildly. But before Hiccup could get near enough to help, it stabilized by itself, and therefore the flight to the island was rather uneventful.

This time, the two vikings made no attempt to hide themselves and their dragons from the Naats - there was simply no more time to waste.

The giants looked shocked and battle-ready at first, but - likely - thanks to Tarkans constant grunting, which was probably some form of reassurement, they didn´t attack. Instead, they let Hiccup and Astrid land and hand over - or rather: tell Stormfly to drop - the rod. As soon as they had backed off, two of the Naats picked it up and rammed it into the earth vertically, gradually pushing it deeper afterwards. As soon as it seemed steady, all the Naats including Tarkan gathered around it.

For what felt like a very long time, Astrid and Hiccup watched the Naats silently, listening to the Naat´s occasional grunting and rumbling, the hot afternoon sun burning on their necks.

'Is it working?', Astrid whispered after a while.

'I have no clue', Hiccup whispered back. 'But based on the fact they aren´t attacking us, I hope that it is.'

Then, finally, the Naats backed away. The rod now seemed to be connected to some kind of metallic box through several tiny, colored plastic tubes, but Hiccup couldn´t deduce whether the Naats had backed away because they had had to admit their machine wouldn´t work or because they had finished it.

Tarkan walked away from the others and Hiccup followed him, dragging Astrid along. As they walked, he became more and more impatient. When the Naat finally sat down, he immediately grabbed a stick and wrote 'Did it work?' into the dirt. After what felt like another eternity, the Naat was done tapping on his tablet. He faced it towards them and let it play: 'Yes - now - all - wait'.


	6. Opportunities

And wait they did.

During the next week, the Naats ate no more fish, but the fish stock in the area was still lower than normal, so the vikings had to be careful not to fish too much because it needed time to recover. Therefore, the food on Berk needed to be rationed.

To Hiccup´s shock, the fact that there were aliens on a nearby islands was leaked on the second day after Hiccup the transmitting station had been finished. No-one knew who it had been that couldn´t keep his mouth shut, but it didn´t matter in the end: Soon, everybody on Berk knew that there were huge, intimidating, alien beasts on a nearby island.

But luckily, the tales that spread around the village were often so frightening that nobody really seemed to be all that curious to find out more about the aliens. Most people actually seemed quite content that their 'fearless' young chief was taking care of this issue - and as it seemed, he had already been quite successful. After all, nobody had starved or had to suffer severe hunger.

But the Naats were still there. Hiccup flew other to their island every few days in hopes of seeing them gone or in the process of leaving, but he was disappointed every single time.

After two weeks, Tarkan finally had something new to tell Hiccup during his visit. He seemed very excited - at least Hiccup thought so - and had already prepared his words on his tablet: 'We - got - signal - from - trading - people - will - land - here - tomorrow - they - take - us - you - can - come - too'.

Hiccup rejoiced at first, but then his enthusiasm dropped in an instant. Tarkan wanted him to come along? Why? He had a place here on Berk! And on top of that, the things Tarkan had told him about what was going on in space didn´t exactly seem inviting.

'Why should I come to space with you?', Hiccup asked, writing in the dirt.

The Naat pushed some buttons, then let the tablet answer for him: 'Good - mind - can - end - war'. Then, the tablet showed a lengthy text that Tarkan had written in viking runes. Hiccup sat down and read it.

Apparently, there was a huge war going on. The Naats were a people of soldiers that were created for the sole purpose of serving and fighting for another species, the so-called Arconides. The was a picture of an Arconide beside the text, they were vaguely humanoid, extremely slender creatures with pale skin. Everything about them radiated pure arrogance. It was easy to guess they hardly did any physical work, instead spending their time sitting in comfy chairs surrounded by holographic images or with a helmet on their head that took their minds to a wholly different place. While Hiccup was kind of curious as to how a species could even become that way, he didn´t exactly fancy meeting an individual that belonged to it.

Their enemies in war were the Maahks. Tarkan didn´t have any actual pictures or holographic depictions of one, just drawings. Those depicted them as large, eerie spider-like beings with black skin that had eight tentacles instead of legs. Hiccup wasn´t exactly looking forward to meeting one of those, either.

But what bothered Hiccup most was that the text didn´t explain how the war had started and what the parties were fighting for. The maahks lived on planets with atmospheres mostly made out of nitrogen and methane, while the arconides lived on planets whose atmospheres contained large amounts of oxygen - like the one the vikings lived on, as Tarkan had told Hiccup earlier.

'So why are you even at war?', Hiccup wrote slowly.

Tarkan didn´t answer for a long time.

Then he wrote: 'Because it has always been this way. But I want to end it.'

Hiccup was completely baffled. He couldn´t comprehend that thousands of lives were ended and unimaginable amounts of resources were wasted - just because it had always been this way? And frankly, he didn´t want to get pulled into it. He just wanted to live a nice live on Berk, exploring the world with Astrid and making his mother proud.

But a nagging inner voice made him fear he wouldn´t be able to do that. He would never be able to just return to his normal, isolated life now that he knew there was so much more out there.

And he would never be able to forgive himself for not taking the chance to try and stop the war that was going on out there.

But did he even have a chance? Wasn´t this a bit too big -even for him? Could he really end this kind of war? When he hardly knew anything about any of the parties, not to mention all the customs he´d have to follow in order to not offend anybody during a negotiation?

Wouldn´t it be better to keep living on Berk, even if he wouldn´t be as content with himself, than to fly to space and get himself killed in an instant?

He needed more time to think about this. Hiccup bid Tarkan farewell and returned to Berk.

After Hiccup had informed Astrid and Valka of the new developments, he took a stroll in the forest of Berk. This was... unexpected. Sudden.

Terrifying.

He felt a sudden surge of aggression. He wanted to punch something, find an outlet for his anger. It seemed like the world had just didn´t want him to be happy. What did he do to deserve this? For eighteen years, he had tried his very best every single day - and this was what he got for it? A situation where he knew that, no matter which choice he made, he wouldn´t be happy with it? If he left, he would probably never see the people of Berk again. Even if he wouldn´t age as much during interstellar travel, relativity would cause decades to have passed before he came back. He´d have to leave Toothless, and likely Astrid as well. And who would take care of the town? Valka had been able to keep it in a good state for a few days, but Hiccup knew she lacked the experience and training to keep running it all by herself.

Hiccup sat down on a tree stump and buried his head in his hands, trying to make a decision.

No.

He couldn´t do this. The offer was tempting, but he couldn´t just leave Astrid and Toothless alone. Unless... he could take them with him. But he quickly dropped that idea. A spaceship was likely no place for a dragon, and he didn´t even know if Astrid would want to come with him.

With a mix of contentedness and silent sorrow, he stood up and walked back to his and Astrid´s cabin.

Valka and Astrid were waiting for him there, their looks full of worry and compassion. They could only guess what he was going through, but it wasn´t hard to see it wasn´t exactly enjoyable.

Valka stood up, softly stroked his cheek with her hand and smiled at him. Hiccup tried his best to force a smile onto his lips, too. Then Valka pulled him into a long, consoling embrace.

When it was over, they both sat down. 'I don´t know what to do', Hiccup announced after taking a deep breath. 'But I´m sure that´s not news to you. If I stay here, I will never stop dwelling on what could have been and regret that I didn´t take this opportunity. If I leave, I could never forgive myself for abandoning the two of you, Toothless, and Berk. It would be irresponsible.'

For a while, there was silence.

Then, Valka responded slowly, choosing each of her words carefully: 'But you shouldn´t feel obligated to give up your dreams. Don´t let Berk hold you back. Gobber and I will find a new chief eventually, and he has enough experience to help me keep running the town until then.'

'But what about Astrid and Toothless? I can´t leave them alone!', Hiccup exclaimed, struggling to keep his voice steady.

Valka drew in a deep breath, but before she could say anything, Astrid interfered: 'Well... I´d definitely come with you.'

That led to a moment of dumbfounded silence. After Hiccup caught himself, he inquired: 'What?'

'I said I would definitely come with you. I´m not letting you go alone. If you go, I will follow.'

Because Hiccup still didn´t seem to be able to believe his luck, she added: 'I didn´t wait an eternity for you to confess your feelings to me just to let you leave me like this!' and chuckled.

Hiccup´s face lit up. So Astrid would come along! Suddenly, the idea of leaving the planet with the Naats didn´t seem so unrealistic anymore. But what about Toothless? And if Astrid came, they would have to take Stormfly, too! Would there even be space for the two of them in a spaceship? And what would those traders that the Naats had contacted think about extra passengers? Maybe he could offer to give them some viking helmets and weapons to pay for the passage?

Then another issue dawned on him: What about food? What if the traders didn´t have an food that was edible for vikings on board? They´d starve in space!

There really were a lot of things left he needed to check with Tarkan. But now that the decision was made, Hiccup was confident there would be a way.

And there was. By the evening of the same day, Tarkan had dispersed Hiccup´s doubts and worries. Apparently, the traders - they called themselves Mehandor - were used to transporting all different kind of species and therefore had all the technology they could possibly need to make a new species feel at home on their ships. Perhaps they could even build a device that could translate the viking´s language much more fluently! According to Tarkan, it was quite usual for intergalactic travelers to have such devices - but of course, the one the Naats had had with them didn´t know the viking´s language.

The only thing that remained unclear was how willing the Mehandor would be to take extra passengers and what they would demand in return. And what the Naats would actually do once they were back in space. To Caso, Vinar and Resh, it was obvious that the first thing to do would be to contact the Arconides. But Tarkan wasn´t so eager to return to the army. He would much rather accompany Hiccup and Astrid or take up a peaceful job - possibly even on a Mehandor-station.

Then came the time to say goodbye. Hiccup had a strange feeling in his heart as he walked towards the cliff he and Astrid would take off from. Had he really seen his last-ever sunset over Berk? Had he really just slept in his bed for the last time?

It felt like all his senses were heightened, eager to notice every detail and burn it into his memory. He could hear waves lapping at the bottom of the cliff, a soft breeze rustling in the trees and ruffling his hair. He could sense the smell of the forest and that of fish, being carried over from the storage building by the wind. He could see the silhouettes of Gobber and Valka standing atop the cliff, still a few hundred meters away from him.

Then, suddenly, he was nearly there with them. Where had the last minute gone? The time was moving by so fast, far too fast, seconds slipping through his fingers like water, he didn´t want to leave Valka yet, he had spent too little time with her, he hadn´t told her how much he loved her! Oh, he had been such an idiot, feeling alone when she had always been there for him! How was he ever going to make this up? A single tear began to form in his right eye.

Valka pulled him into an embrace and patted his back. 'It´s okay', she whispered. 'It´s okay.'

Hiccup rested his cheek on the furry hood of Valka´s clothing, drying his tears. He could feel her warmth, feel her soft skin, hear her calm breaths.

When they separated, Hiccup had lost all feeling for time. He swallowed hard, desperately looking for fitting words. But there were none.

'Thank you... for everything', he finally said. 'You were a great mother. I love you.'

Valka smiled kindly. 'I love you too. But you must go now. You need to live your own life.'

Struggling to suppress a sob, Hiccup gulped again. 'Okay', he said when he finally regained control over his voice, pulling Valka into one last embrace.

Then he mounted his dragon. In the meantime, Valka had laid put both her hands on Astrid´s shoulders. 'Take good care of yourself and my boy, okay?'

'I promise I will', Astrid said, a serious look on her face. Then she too hugged Valka tightly before turning away and mounting her dragon.

After the two young vikings took off, Valka stood on that cliff for a long time, her right had placed on her heart, watching them turn into tiny, black dots on the horizon and ultimately disappearing. She was worried, yes, but mostly she was proud. Hiccup had undergone quite a change since the Naats first landed on Berk. He had grown up. And now her little boy was setting out on a quest for peace - how could she not be proud of him?

After the vikings had brought all their luggage to the island, there was nothing left to do but wait. Hiccup and Astrid stood beside each other, holding hands and staring at the sky, looking for any sign of - well, anything that might be a spaceship - approaching.

Fortunately, it was quite cloudy that day, so staying outside all day was no problem at all.

Then, just after noon had passed, something happened. At first, it was just a distant hiss that grew louder and louder. Then, a cylinder broke through the cloud cover. It was impossible to tell its size at first, but as it got closer, it quickly became clear that it was much larger than Hiccup had imagined. Much, much larger.

As it neared the ground, the engine sounds grew deafening and the wind nearly swept the vikings off their feet, covering the scenery in blown-up dust and dirt.

Hiccup closed his eyes and covered his face, leaning forward in order to stand more securely. Astrid ducked down behind him, using his body as cover.

When the engines finally slowed down and the dust had settled down, the full size of the object became comprehensible.

The cylindrical ship had a diameter of roughly 20 meters and was around 60 meters long. It towered high over the Naats and even some of the trees. To prevent it from rolling, a plethora of landing struts had emerged from its bottom side.

Just as Hiccup wanted to ask what was going to happen next, a curved gangway was lowered. A single creature appeared.

It was mostly covered in a grey, bulky space suit, so Hiccup wasn´t sure what the being looked like. He could only make out a vaguely humanoid shape with an extra pair of arms emerging from the sides.

After letting its gaze drift over the assembled Naats, it began to walk down the gangway lumberingly. When it finally reached the Naats, it seemed to start communicating with them in some way.

'What´s happening?', Astrid whispered, her hands still on Hiccup´s shoulders, ready to duck back down at the slightest impression of danger.

'I´m not sure. I think they´re negotiating.'

'Look, that thing just pointed at us!', Astrid whispered and ducked deeper behind Hiccup´s shoulders. She was visibly afraid - her expression reminded him of the first time he took her to fly on Toothless. 'Don´t worry', Hiccup whispered back, trying to reassure her. But he could understand her fear. It was always terrifying to be faced with something new, something one did or could not understand, for the first time. Especially when it was this unusual, this strange, this... alien. It was only because Hiccup had been talking to Tarkan quite often that he was now able to contain his fear a bit better.

When the Mehandor and the Tarkan were done doing whatever they had been doing, Tarkan handed his tablet to the Mehandor and the alien took it back into its ship. A minute or so later, the creature came wavering towards hiccup. It was carrying what seemed like a pair of glasses in one of its four hands. As it reached Hiccup, Astrid jumped away, visibly scared - it was obvious she didn´t want to come too close to the Mehandor. Hiccup wanted to do the same, but resisted the urge.

Instead, he allowed the strange creature to put the object on his nose.

When it backed away, there seemed to be a blue-ish box hovering in the air on the top left periphery of his vision. Alienated, Hiccup swung his head around to try and get a better look at it before he understood that it must be part of the glasses.

Suddenly, as the Mehandor began to produce unintelligible sounds, the box filled with text: 'Hello. My name is Erin.'

Baffled, Hiccup didn´t know to respond. When he finally found his voice again, it was still embarrassingly stuttering. 'N-N-Nice to meet you. I´m Hiccup. C-Can you underst-stand me?'

He felt like banging his head against a tree. So much for making a good, self-confident first impression. But who knew whether the Mehandor was even able to tell he was nervous?

Erin 'spoke' again and more text appeared. 'I know who you are. And yes, I can understand you. Tarkan told me the two of you and your... pets want to come visit our station, too. But that won´t be cheap. What have you got to offer?'

Hiccup, who had been standing still up until now, broke into hectic movement, running over to Toothless, rummaging around in one of the bags until he finally produced a polished Viking helmet, which he then presented to Erin. 'We´ve brought some cultural goods from our people...'

The Mehandor began to flail around all four of her its arms wildly while bending forwards and backwards without following any recognizable pattern. Hiccup was confused. Was it angry? Or laughing? And why?

After a while, a 3rd message appeared. 'Very funny, but we have no interest in the cultural goods of some irrelevant, underdeveloped civilization.' Hiccup was tempted to retort that the Mehandor civilization had surely started out as irrelevant sometime in the past too, but he decided that that would only anger his conversational partner.

Instead, he went for a pity-inducing approach, sinking to his knees and hoping the Mehandor would be able to interpret the gesture. 'So what is there that we can do to make you take us with you?'

It seemed to be effective - Erin seemed to be taken aback, shooting a quick glance over to Tarkan as if to ask him how to react. After a few more moments of hesitation, it offered: 'But perhaps you could pay the flight by working for us.'

Hiccup got back up, but stayed cautious. This was a people of traders. He shouldn´t show them how eager he was to accept - it would weaken his own position when it came to the negotiation of the price. 'How long and under what conditions would you expect us to work in exchange for the voyage?'

Erin seemed to think for a moment, then answered: 'You are lucky. My station is still orbiting the planet, so it won´t be all that far. Counting in that we will have to provide you and your...companions with living space and food for the duration of your stay - we are no slave drivers, after all - you will be free after no longer than the amount of time you seem to refer to as 'three months'.'

'Two months and we´ve got a deal', Hiccup stated.

Suddenly, Astrid interrupted the conversation by grabbing Hiccup´s shoulder roughly and turning him to face her. 'Ouch! What was that for?', he whispered.

'Perhaps you should consider asking me first before making a deal with that...thing! What is it asking for, anyways?', Astrid whispered back, visibly agitated.

'We and our dragons can come, but we´ll have to work for the Mehandor for two -'

Another message popped up: 'Three!'

'Three months. Then we are free to go wherever we want. I know that´s a long time, but it seems to be our only chance.'

Astrid stared at him wordlessly for a few seconds, then forced down her anger at being left out and calmly said: 'Okay then. I trust you to know what´s best for us. As I said: Where you go, I will follow.'

'Thank you', Hiccup said, gifted her a quick smile and turned back to the Mehandor.

'We accept your offer.', Hiccup said and held out his hand to seal the deal.

Though apparently not used to using the ritual of shaking hands to validate agreements, Erin took it and encased it with two of its hands. They seemed to be much larger than Hiccups, but it was hard to tell their actual size under the space suit.

Afterwards, all passengers gathered their luggage - the Naats were going to leave the transmitting station turned off, but still standing on the island since it was so bulky even a Naat would have had trouble transporting it - and entered the spaceship. From the inside, it looked much smaller than from the outside - Hiccup guessed that a large part of the volume was taken up by all kinds of machinery. After the gateway had closed, 4 Naat-sized and 3 human-sized chairs emerged from the floor. Everybody but the two dragons sat down and buckled up.

Before they started, Erin seemed to go through some kind of welcome routine, which Hiccup relayed to Astrid by whispering: 'Welcome aboard. Please make sure to put your seatbelts on properly. Despite our usage of the newest in G-Force absorbing technology, strong acceleration or deceleration maneuvers may be perceivable inside the craft. On top of that, large screens on the walls will transmit live images from our outside cameras. None of this is any reason to panic. We guarantee your safety during this flight. Thank you for your attention.'

Then, without further warning, Hiccup was pressed deep into his seat. Fortunately, both Stormfly and Toothless had already been laying on the ground, or else they might have crushed their feet with their bodies. But the acceleration process was short. After no longer than a few seconds, the gravity inside the ship returned to normal. Hiccup looked around and noticed that the walls were now indeed showing images of clouds rushing by at incredible speed. The Naats seemed to be widely unaffected and completely unsurprised by the sudden acceleration - perhaps they had gotten used to it over years of intergalactic traveling?

He turned his head to look at Astrid and put touched her arm with his hand. 'Are you okay?', he whispered.

'Yes... It´s just a little much', she responded, just as quietly.

'I know. Try not to worry too much. It´s going to be okay.'

He leaned back in his chair and enjoyed the view for a few minutes, watching the cloud cover disappear behind them, the way the earth was bent slowly becoming more and more visible until the whole planet was in sight.

Then, as Hiccup felt his body become weightless, another object came into sight. He unstrapped himself from his seat and floated over to the monitor to get a better view. The object was a cylindrical spaceship like the one they were currently traveling in - but far, far bigger! He was about to ask Erin how big exactly it was when his glasses provided him with some additional data. Apparently, the station had about fifteen times the length and ten times the diameter of their ship - making its volume and capacity roughly 1500 times that of their vehicle. Besides that, it was rotating around its center slowly in order to create artificial gravity inside - from space, it almost looked like a symmetric, spinning bottle. A structural diagram popped up: the inside was divided into a plethora of circular floors - much like a sausage would be chopped into many thin slices - each with a slightly different gravity: the ones in the center of the station were suited to shelter creatures that needed lower gravity, the ones at the ends of the cylinder were suited as housing for beings that were used to higher gravities - like the Naats.

While he was reading, Hiccup´s mouth had dropped open further and further. Even he had trouble taking in that there were peoples who had the technology to construct such a monstrous space station. When Astrid worked up the courage to unfasten her seatbelts and float over to him, he did not react at all. There were no words that could describe what he was feeling.

After a few moments of silence, Tarkan joined Astrid and Hiccup. As softly as he could, he put one of his paws on Hiccup´s shoulder. Following his example, Astrid laid her hand on the other shoulder.

Tarkan made a few grunting sounds, and to Hiccup´s surprise, his glasses translated them. 'You´re still so full of awe, full of wonder... That is what most other peoples lack. They just take the wonders of the universe for granted. Never forget to marvel at its beauty.'

Hiccup was slightly taken aback by the depth of these words. It wasn´t hard to tell Tarkan really had high hopes about him... But could he really fulfill them?

They stayed like this for a long time. Three travelers, connected by fate or chance - who could tell? - looking towards an uncertain future.


	7. Astronauts

A little while later, the side ship - that´s how the 12 smaller space ships that the Mehandor´s station was carrying with it were called - had reached the main station and docked onto it. Erin had told the vikings and their dragons to follow her for some basic medical tests before they would be led to their room, the Naats were directly led to their temporary homes.

'So this is really how you want to part ways with us?', Caso asked. The four Naats had gathered around a table to discuss their next steps.

'But the arconides are going to ask questions. They know that there are four Naats missing, not three.'

'Think of something. Tell them that I died in the crash or that I tried to run away and got killed in the process somehow. And make sure that the Mehandor keep their mouths shut, too. That planet´s inhabitants are probably not listed in any of the arconide´s databases - and they´ve hopefully got more important things to do than send a scouting mission to confirm that whatever you tell them killed me really exists. Find a way to make me fall through the cracks of the system.', Tarkan solicited.

Caso signaled his approval by stomping the ground with his right foot. 'Okay. We will respect your decision, even though we cannot understand it. But how will you get around? You won´t be able to live off military funds anymore, and if you want to go into hiding, it would be unwise to access your private banking accounts.'

'I will find a way. I´ve already got Erin to give me a booth that´s further away from yours so the Arconides won´t noticed anything when they get you', Tarkan reassured them, full of confidence. After a while, he added: 'This will be our goodbye then.'

'Yes. Farewell, Tarkan.'

'Farewell.'

Erin led Hiccup, Astrid and the two dragons through seemingly never-ending, huge corridors. As they walked, they could feel the gravity decreasing - it felt like a weight was slowly being lifted off their shoulders - but the change was rather slight.

Every now and then, they passed other passengers. And it was just like Tarkan had told them: There were dozens, if not hundreds of different species on board. Some walked on two legs, some on four, some on six, some on even more. Some filled almost the whole hallway, some others were so small that Hiccup had to be careful not to accidently step on them. When they arrived at the medical station, Hiccup wasn´t even sure whether they had come across any species twice on the way there.

Inside, Erin asked them to stand, sit, and lay inside or in front of a plethora of strange machines whose purpose Hiccup and Astrid couldn´t even guess. But they and their dragons obeyed Erin without objection - they had no real choice anyways. Luckily, none of the examinations involved undressing, which was a huge relief to the vikings. The Mehandor seemed to have a rather... strange relation to covering their bodies: Since she had taken off her space suit, Erin had been walking around naked except for a strange hood covering most of her head, exposing green skin with bronze speckles all over her body. Hiccup was unsure whether those speckles were some kind of body paint or tattoo or whether they were natural. However, because he feared Erin might be offended by either his lack of knowledge or his bluntness, he did not dare to ask. And who knew, maybe what he thought to be her skin was really just some kind of tight clothing.

After what felt like an eternity, all the tests were finished. Neither Hiccup and Astrid nor their dragons had been ranked as a threat to the station, so they were allowed to stay. Erin led them through some more corridors, then they were finally shown what their home for the next three months would be.

It was a very functional and plain booth, seemingly made completely from one blueish, metallic material. It was perhaps five meters long and four meters wide, with a table and two chairs in the middle. To the left and the right, there were what seemed to be two beds, though there were neither mattresses nor covers nor pillows in sight, just two smooth, elevated areas large enough for a human to lay on. At the foot ends of these beds were two hollows, apparently for the dragons to curl up in.

'There will be three meals during the time you are used to as a 'day' and your work will be scheduled to fit the sleep rhythm your species is used to', Erin said. In the meantime, Astrid had received a pair of translating glasses as well, so Hiccup did no longer have to relay every word she said. 'You will have your first day off so you can get used to living on the station and explore it a bit. After that, you will have every 5th day off to relax. Any questions?'

After a moment of hesitation, Hiccup asked: 'Yes. Erm... Where are we supposed to... you know... defecate?' Jumping from one leg to the other, he added: 'Because I kind of have to right now...'

Erin flailed her arms around again, apparently amused. After a few seconds, she went into a the booth and touched a hardly-visible button on the back wall. Suddenly, a crack formed in the back wall and began to grow wider and wider, revealing a smaller, entirely white room with a sink, a toilet and a shower cabin. 'We tried to design it in a way that your species will be able to use intuitively. If there´s anything else you need, you can just call me by - ' Erin was interrupted by Hiccup rushing past her, searching for the button to close the wall and doing so as soon as he found it.

Looking at her dumbfounded expression, Astrid couldn´t help but giggle. After a few seconds, the Mehandor joined in. Then she pointed to another area of the wall and continued: 'As I was saying - you can call me by pressing this button'.

Astrid nodded and thanked her. With a chuckle, Erin commented: 'Oh, you can talk too? I was starting to doubt that...'

The young viking lady blushed violently and tried to punch the Mehandor´s side, but the latter evaded the blow swiftly, and both laughed again.

Then, Erin left. Astrid fetched the dragons, which had remained outside the booth up until now, and led them in, showing them their sleeping hollows. They seemed uneasy at first, but as soon as Toothless stepped into one of the hollows tentatively, he seemed to become more confident and curled up in it completely - apparently it was quite comfy. Stormfly followed his example.

Since she didn´t know what else to do, Astrid closed the front door and sat down on the bed on the right side. It was surprisingly soft, and she nearly lost her balance as she sank into the surface. Curiously, she traced the surface with her hand. The wall seemed perfectly solid, only the rectangular space of the 'bed' was flexible.

At that moment, the crack in the back door reappeared and Hiccup stepped out with a relieved expression on his face.

'What are you doing?', he asked.

'Trying to figure out how this material works... For some reason, it´s extremely hard in some places but really flexible in others...' Hiccup´s eyes began to gleam as he ran over to the other bed to investigate this effect. 'Fascinating...', he whispered.

Astrid laughed. This childish excitement was exactly what she loved about him. He was always looking for something new, something he didn´t yet understand so that he could examine it and acquire new knowledge. Still giggling, she stood up, walked around the table, and placed a peck on Hiccup´s cheek.

Hiccup´s face turned to the approximate color of a tomato, causing Astrid to burst out into laughter once again. 'Awwww... You´re so adorable', she gushed, pulling him into a hug and merrily messing up his oh-so-majestic hair.

But she could tell Hiccup was enjoying it. A wide, content smile formed on his face as he closed his eyes.

Right at that moment, the front door opened and revealed Tarkan standing outside. Or, well, about half of his massive body. The door was way too low and too for him to walk through even on all fours. Taken aback by the two Vikings' positions, he took one step away from the booth´s entrance and asked: 'Is this an unfitting moment?'

Astrid and Hiccup backed away from each other, both chuckling. To Hiccup´s surprise, Astrid took the lead and said: 'No, not at all. What´s up?'

Tarkan seemed confused by the question. 'Umm... the center of the station?', he grunted.

Astrid took a moment to understand what he had meant, then chuckled and explained: 'Oh. That´s just an expression. It means something along the lines of 'Is there anything you want to tell us about?'

'Ah, I see. I actually did want to talk to the two of you.'

'Why?'

'I just talked to my comrades and they agreed to report that I got lost on the mission. That means I´ll be free to go where I want now! I´ll never have to fight for the army again!', Tarkan exclaimed, his voice growing louder with every word until the Vikings and even the Dragons had to cover their ears, the deafening grunts echoing and seeming even louder in the confined space they were in.

When Tarkan was finished, they all cautiously removed their hands from their ears again.

'Congratulations, but... could you please try to keep your voice a bit lower next time?', Hiccup asked.

Apparently, Tarkan hadn´t even realized how loud he was being. 'Oh, I´m sorry... I´ll try to not do that again.'

'So what exactly are you planning to do now?', Astrid asked, taking the lead again.

'Isn´t that obvious? I´m going to stay with you! I know my way around the universe a lot better than you, and you definitely have a lot to learn before you can even think about getting involved with politics.'

Slightly taken aback, Hiccup and Astrid looked at each other for a while, both searching for a response in the other´s face. After a few seconds of awkward silence, Hiccup slowly agreed: 'Well, I don´t see why not.'

'Me neither', Astrid approved.

'Great!', Tarkan exclaimed. 'Are you ready for a tour of this station?'

'Definitely', the two vikings responded simultaneously, both smiling widely.

* * *

Author's Note: Sorry for taking so long to post the final chapters ^^;;; I am already working on a sequel though.


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